5.  The applicants were born in 1960, 1979 and 1987 respectively and live in Petrinja.
6.  The documents submitted by the parties reveal the following facts.
7.  On 9 August 1991 the Sisak Police lodged a criminal complaint with the Sisak County State Attorney’s Office against a person or persons unknown, alleging that at about 11 p.m. on 4 August 1991 V.B., who was driving a coach, had been stopped by a road patrol; he had allegedly not complied with the orders given and had been beaten up. He had been taken to the Sisak Hospital where he died soon afterwards. The autopsy was carried out on 5 August 1991. V.B. was the applicants’ respective husband and father.
8.  On 9 August 1991 the Sisak Police interviewed Vl.P., who told them that on 4 August 1991 he had been in a bar in Odra when V.H. and M.S., both dressed in Croatian Army uniforms and armed with automatic guns, asked him to drive a coach to Sisak. They had kept the driver, V.B., with them. Vl.P. had complied with the order and two other Croatian soldiers, I.C. and M.B., had accompanied him in the coach while Mi.T., another Croatian soldier, followed them in a vehicle. There had been about ten passengers on the coach. When he subsequently returned to Odra, V.B. was no longer there.
9.  In 1996 the United Nations Security Council established the United Nations Transitional Administration in Eastern Slavonia, Baranja and Western Sirmium (the “UNTAES”). On 15 January 1998 the UNTAES mandate ceased and the transfer of power to the Croatian authorities began.
10.  V.H. died in 1997.
11.  The documents submitted by the parties do not indicate that any steps were taken between 9 August 1991 and 22 October 2002.
12.  M.B. (see paragraphs 13, 15, 22, 25 and 26 below) died on 25 June 2002.
13.  Between 22 October 2002 and 4 March 2003 the Sisak Police interviewed ten former Croatian soldiers who had been stationed in the Sisak area. D.M., interviewed on 19 February 2003, said that in 1991 he had worked in the Sisak Police. One night he and two of his colleagues, H. and K., had been instructed by Croatian soldiers to go to the Odra Community Centre (Društveni dom Odra), where they had arrested one person. On their arrival, V.H., one of the soldiers who was personally known to D.M., told him that the arrested person could not walk. There had been about twenty men in camouflage uniforms. He had recognised M.B., who was commander of the unit. The arrested man, named [V.]B., had been put into the back of the vehicle. He had been covered in blood, was unconscious and could hardly breathe. They had taken [V.]B. to the police station in Sisak and then to a hospital.
14.  D.K., interviewed on 20 February 2003, said that he knew who had beaten up V.B. and that he had told an inspector everything at the material time, and would not reveal the identity of the perpetrators to the police. He described in detail the events of 4 August 1991 with regard to the killing of V.B. and said that it had occurred in the Odra Community Centre where a Croatian Army unit had been stationed. He had been upstairs and heard some noise downstairs. He had gone down to see what was happening, and had seen V.B. lying in blood and surrounded by some soldiers.
15.  Several of the soldiers interviewed identified M.B. as the commander of the unit which was stationed in the Odra Community Centre.
16.  On 20 February 2003 the Sisak Police also interviewed M.S., who denied any involvement in the abduction and killing of V.B.
17.  On 26 February 2003 the Sisak Police again interviewed Vl.P. He stated that he had joined the Croatian Army during the summer of 1991, probably in June, and had been with a unit that was stationed in the Odra Community Centre. The commander of that unit was D.K. On the night when V.B. had been stopped at the checkpoint in Odra, Vl.P. had been in a bar at a crossroads. There had been a lot of people in the bar, but he could not remember any of them. At one point someone had approached him and told him that he must drive a coach back to Sisak because the driver had been apprehended. When he exited the bar he had seen a coach parked on the street and V.B. standing next to it. He had not seen that V.B. had been physically ill-treated. He did not remember who had been there.
18.  On 1 October 2003 the Sisak Police compiled a report on the investigation into the killing of V.B. in which the documents from the case-file were listed and described.
19.  On 29 July 2005 the State Attorney’s Office issued a document concerning enquiries into the killings of civilians between 1991 and 1995. The document was addressed to the County State Attorney’s Offices, which were required to examine all of the information collected to date on the killings of civilians during that period and to concentrate their activities on identifying the perpetrators and gathering the relevant evidence in order to initiate criminal proceedings.
20.  On 9 October 2008 the State Attorney’s Office issued an instruction for implementation of the Criminal Code and the Code of Criminal Procedure to the County State Attorney’s Offices, in which they stated that an inspection of their work had indicated two main problems: possible partiality of the persons involved in the pending proceedings as regards the ethnicity of the victims or the perpetrators; and the problem of trials in absentia. The instructions favoured impartial investigations of all war crimes, irrespective of the ethnicity of those involved, whether victims or perpetrators, and stressed the duties of those working for the State Attorney in that respect.
21.  In January 2009 the Sisak Police interviewed six former policemen or Croatian soldiers who had been stationed in the Sisak area in 1991. S.Š., interviewed on 28 January 2009, said that he had been one of the soldiers in the Croatian Army unit stationed in the Odra Community Centre in 1991 when V.B. had been killed. He had not personally witnessed the event, but had later heard that M.S. and V.H. had taken V.B. from a coach and beaten him, and that J.B. (who died in 2002) had also been present.
22.  When interviewed by the Sisak Police on 29 January 2009, D.M. (see paragraph 12 above) reiterated that he had been a policeman between 1981 and 1998, when he had retired. As regards the killing of V.B., one night in August 1991 he had been ordered to go to Odra together with two other officers, H. and K. They had parked a police wagon in front of the Odra Community Centre and he, D.M., had stayed in the vehicle, while H. and K. had entered the building. A certain N.H. had approached him and they had spoken for few moments. He had heard some noise from inside the Odra Community Centre. A member of the special police, M.B., had approached him and told him to park the police wagon at the entrance of the Odra Community Centre. H. and K. had got into the vehicle, saying that “these people are not normal”. A person had been pushed into the back of the police wagon. He had not seen who had done it, but supposed that they had been the members of the special police whose commander had been M.B. When they had arrived in Sisak, the police officers had opened the wagon and D.M. had seen V.B. covered in blood and breathing with difficulty. They had then driven him to the emergency ward.
23.  Vl.P. died on 8 February 2009.
24.  N.H. died on 13 September 2009.
25.  On 13 December 2010 the Osijek County State Attorney’s Office asked the Sisačko-moslavača Police Department to collect the relevant information regarding various cases concerning war crimes committed by unknown perpetrators. With regard to the killing of V.B., they asked the police to interview D.B., who had been the duty officer of the Sisak Police between 10 p.m. on 4 August 1991 and 6 a.m. on 5 August 1991, and who had allegedly informed his superiors about the arrest of V.B. He was to be asked in particular which of his superiors he had informed, what had been ordered by the superiors, which operative officer had been in charge and why M.B. and the person called D.[V.H.] – who had been identified by witness D.K. as possible direct perpetrators – had not been interviewed.
26.  On 28 December 2010 the Sisačko-moslavača Police Department submitted a report to the Osijek County State Attorney’s Office. The relevant part concerning the killing of V.B. reads:
“... a report on the interview with D.B., who was the duty officer of the Sisak Police between 10 p.m. on 4 August 1991 and 6 a.m. on 5 August 1991 is enclosed. In the register of operative duty it is stated that on that day police officers M., K., H., S. and Nj. were in charge of the inquiry into the case of V.B. A criminal complaint against an unknown perpetrator was lodged by officer R.Š. She was interviewed on 5 August 1991 by officer Z.S. who carried out interviews in connection with the B. case. It has not been established why M.B. and the person called D.[V.H.] have not been interviewed.”
27.  On 20 June 2011 the Sisak County Police lodged a criminal complaint against Đ.B., V.M and D.B. on charges of war crimes against the civilian population. This included the killing of the applicants’ relative. On the same day Đ.B., Head of the Sisak Police Department in 1991 and 1992, V.M., police commander at the border territory of Sisak and Banovina in 1991 and 1992 and Deputy of Sisak Police Department, and D.B., a member of the “Wolves” Unit of the Croatian Army, were arrested.
28.  On an unspecified date the investigation was opened and on 13 July 2011 Đ.B. died.
29.  On 16 December 2011 the Osijek County State Attorney’s Office lodged an indictment against V.M. and D.B. at the Osijek County Court, alleging that they had been in command of the unit whose unknown members committed a number of crimes against the civilian population between July 1991 and June 1992, including the killings of the applicants’ relative. They were charged with war crimes against the civilian population.
30.  On 9 December 2013 a first-instance judgment was delivered. V.M. was found guilty of war crimes against the civilian population in that he, in his capacity as “the commander of police forces in the broader area of Sisak and Banovina” and “Deputy Head of the Sisak Police”, had allowed the killings of persons of Serbian origin and had failed to undertake adequate measures to prevent such killings. The relevant part of the judgment concerning the applicants’ close relative:
“on 4 August 1991 in Odra Sisačka [the police] unlawfully arrested and took from a ‘Slavijatrans’ coach its driver, V.B., who was then brutally beaten by several unidentified members of the reserve police, stationed in Odra, under the command of M.B., and who died of the injuries thus sustained the same evening in the Sisak Hospital.”
31.  On 10 June 2014 the Supreme Court upheld the conviction of V.M. and increased his sentence to ten years’ imprisonment.
32.  On 15 February 2005 the applicants brought a civil action against the State in the Petrinja Municipal Court, seeking compensation in connection with the death of their close relative. The claim was dismissed on 6 April 2005 and was upheld on appeal by the Sisak County Court and the Supreme Court on 11 September 2008 and 19 May 2010 respectively. The national courts found that the claim had been submitted after the statutory limitation period had expired.
33.  A subsequent constitutional complaint lodged by the applicants was dismissed on 18 May 2011.
34.  Following the criminal conviction of V.M., the applicants sought the reopening of these proceedings in the Petrinja Municipal Court. Their request is now pending.